Saturday Mornings

As a child, my favorite day of the week was Saturday. More specifically Saturday morning.

While many people my age or older also have stories about how they would watch any number of cartoons for me it was different. I would wake up at 4 am and quietly walk out to the living room. I grabbed a bowl of cereal and sat in front of the screen. It was so early that the local FOX affiliate didn’t have programming. The local NBC affiliate was playing Ron Popeil infomercials, but I was up anyway… Waiting… Excited.

There was something about this that was liberating. As the youngest of seven there was rarely a moment I not only had the entire living room to myself, but also control. The first cartoons started at 7 am, and by the time my siblings were up I already watched four different shows. I wasn’t ready to give up this power because I knew exactly what I wanted to watch. By mid-season I knew the rhythms of each channel. In the time before DVR I was king (at least in my living room on Saturday mornings).

I had a relationship with TV prior to this with Sesame Street, but Saturdays were different. They were by choice and not for educational purposes. It was then that I learned how much I loved television. While I lost track of this love when Saturday morning cartoons died out, I found it again when TV reached its “Golden Age.”

It’s not just that I love watching TV to shut my brain off. I like to think about what I’m seeing. To think about what the motivations are, the subtext, and just be a fan of the entire process and the execution… or not. The same way I enjoy a book, I enjoy television. It doesn’t have to be stupid, and I don’t expect it to be, but it all doesn’t have to have high aspirations.

Despite now being a father and husband, I still get excited about television. While I don’t sit as close, or watch as obsessively I still break things down in a way that no one else cares to hear. That’s just me and since people don’t always love to talk about it I’ll share it here.